Talk:Stereotypes of East Asians in the United States/Archive 1

Hello. This page is directly copied/pasted from Ethnic stereotypes in American media. I created it because I believed this subtopic deserves its own focused page. Also, I want this new article to be able to explore racial stereotyping in all areas of public consciousness, not confined to just "media." Since it's basically a direct copy/paste it is obviously in need of extensive editing to make it an independent article, so please contribute. Thanks! --Drenched 19:44, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

Reorganization

I really want to organize this article. I am going to brainstorm here (feel free to add, but please don't delete anything!). A rough outline:

• Intro present, needs fixing
• maybe Stereotypical physical characteristics (there are 2 labeled pictures from Life magazine during the 1940s of a Chinese and Japanese face with arrows and labels all over them, telling American readers how to tell apart Japanese enemies from Chinese people. It brings in complexion, hair distribution, nose height, eye fold, etc. and would be a great example of American stereotypes of Asian features. However, I'm not sure how to/if I can use it due to copyright issues.)
• Historical origins present, needs fixing
  • possibly split by country: US, UK, Australia, the rest of Europe
• Orientalism, Asian mysticism, exoticism created, needs expansion/cleanup
  • e.g. Confucius says, fortune cookies, honor bound, ancient ancient superstitious culture etc.
  • Asian/Indian motif is trendy, white people getting tattoos of Chinese characters even though they're unfamiliar with the language, henna tattoos, Asian prints, Asian shirt cut used in American fashion
• Model minority myth created
  • nerds, overachievers, hard working, doesn't cause trouble, good at science & math, has own communities to help itself.
• Stereotypes of exclusion created
  • Perpetual foreigner stereotype, Japanese internment, exclusion acts created
  • Racial triangulation - unassimilable created
  • Yellow Peril created
• Incomprehensible accent, communication problems - source of racist humor (e.g. Mr. Yunioshi, Ms. Swan, danny the dog) created
• Martial arts experts -Jackie Chan, kung fu etc. etc.
• Major Asian characters in American fiction history (this doesn't quite fit...it's important but I don't know where to put it/how to incorporate) created
  • Fu Manchu -intelligent but dangerous, evil created
  • Charlie Chan -intelligent but harmless, a "good" Asian created
• Stereotypes of Asian men created
  • Sexuality created
    • Emasculation (Kill Bill etc.) created
    • sexual predator to white women (e.g. Thoroughly modern millie, Bitter tea of General Yen, WWII anti-Japanese propaganda posters) created
    • oppressor to Asian women (Miss Saigon)
• Stereotypes of Asian women
  • Sexuality
    • China doll -subservient
    • Dragon lady -dangerous vixen
    • Other variations: mail order bride, war prostitute, self-erasing woman
    • Other points: suitable partners to White men, often need to be rescued from Asian men, often illegitimate mistresses to White men who has a real White woman partner. (reflection of 30% Asian woman/White man couples vs. 8% Asian man/White woman couples in real life)
    • exoticism - slanted pussy, freaky in bed etc.
• Ethnicity-specific occupations
  • Korean store owner
  • Indian taxi driver
  • Chinese Laundromat
  • Asian anchorwoman etc.
• Asians in the media (ahhh I don't know where to put this...)
  • As a sidekick, foil, or archnemesis to whites.
• Action against stereotyping
  • Asian American activism, protests, performances
  • Angry Little Asian Girl, etc.

Scope: movies, television, literature, radio, art, theatre, news/current events/real life, music, etc. Somewhere there needs to be a point about the difference between AMERICAN Asian movies and ASIAN Asian movies imported, Asian American actors vs. Asian actors.

--Drenched 22:58, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

"Asians All Look the Same"

We've all heard it. A lot of people think it's true. It has been an acknowledged stereotype in the media, from Dave Chappelle sketch comedy to the online Korean?/Japanese?/Chinese? quiz www.alllooksame.com. So why no mention in the article? I've added a link to www.alllooksame.com in the External Links. It seems pertinent.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 75.18.164.120 (talk • contribs) 10:11, 7 September 2006 (UTC +10 hours (ie AEST))

You can say the same for Blacks. White people think many minor minority groups looks alike

Filmmakers

Look, asian chicks dig guys in †he film industry. Am I wrong? ShadowyCabal 16:19, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Are you saying that's a stereotype or that's a fact? And where is your source? --- Hong Qi Gong 17:11, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

A stereotype, and maybe I have it wrong. Maybe its filmmakers love asians. ShadowyCabal 20:07, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

I've never ever heard of that stereotype in any of my Asian/Pacific American studies classes or even casually amongst any of my many many Asian friends or in my entire life of being exposed to American media. I can't definitively say that it is absolutely untrue, but I'm going to leave it deleted until you can verify the claim with a reputable source. I'm going to incorporate your section into the intro because Wikipedia MOS prefers prose to list format, and there are already sections that explore most of those characteristics listed in depth, making another section redundant. --Drenched 19:19, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Don't think it's limited to Asian women; fact is, most women aspiring to be actresses will dig guys in the film industry to get ahead. ColourBurst 00:55, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Title

This article needs to be renamed to avoid confusion. Perhaps Oriental stereotype, or Stereotypes of East Asians. violet/riga (t) 08:13, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

That is a UK perspective but not Australian (where I am from) and probably not US either.--Arktos ^talk 08:18, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

This article doesn't cover "Asians" in the UK sense, and thus the title is confusing. "Oriental" may not be correct, given the US definition, but I would've thought that "East Asian" was OK - it must surely be the most unambiguous. violet/riga (t) 10:11, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

American POV/expansion/scope of the article

1. Tag. Thank you AYArktos for adding the global tag; I agree it's much better than the random blurb explaining scope at the beginning.

2. Indians/South Asians/UK Asians. Though this article doesn't address South Asians very much at the moment (or I guess "Asians" from a UK perspective), I don't see why it can't in the future. South Asians are mentioned slightly in some areas right now; under "Yellow Peril" (Hindoo invasion) and the Indian taxi driver stereotype. Perhaps we can create a section just for South Asian stereotypes; however, things get confusing and messy since stereotypes are often appearance-based, and a lot of the stereotypes applied to South Asians are the same as stereotypes applied to Near Easterners/Arabs (e.g. terrorists, "towel heads" etc.) found in this article: Stereotypes of Near Easterners/Arabs. So, our options are:

a. leave the article as it is and incorporate South Asians into the article subsections that apply to them

b. put the whole current article under subheading "East Asians" and then create new subheading "South Asians" to address South Asian stereotypes in an entirely separate sections

c. retitle article, and incorporate South Asians into Near Easterner/Arab article and retitle that article "Stereotypes of Near Easterners/Arabs/South Asians" or something like that.

d. any other solutions y'all can think up of.

3. Global perspectives. How can we incorporate stereotypes of Asians from the non-American Western world? The way I see it, we can either:

a. incorporate non-American countries' stereotypes under the appropriate subsections (e.g. AYArktos mentioning Prince Charles's comment in Australia under already existing "Perpetual Foreigner" section). However, there will still be a very American slant. And sections like "Historical origins" would be very problematic. Sections like "Racial triangulation theory" wouldn't really apply to non-American countries because it's based on American history. So I guess I'm not really in favor of this option, at least not in the long run.

b. Create new subheadings. Sub-head entire current article under "American POV" and make new subheadings for "UK POV" "Australian POV" etc.

c. Retitle article "Stereotypes of Asians in America" and create separate articles for other POVs. However, with options b & c there would be some redundancy & gray areas because several stereotypes are the same/similar in many Western countries. e.g. Miss Saigon opened in the UK, had French composers, and played on successfully on Broadway in America for 11 years or so.

So how do you guys think we should address these issues? --Drenched 19:36, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

• From an Australian perspective, I don't like references to "Near Easterners" - Near to what? I think we allow the article to grow rather than allow a fork. There are more US wikipedians than their population % should reflect but many of the things from the US are global experiences. Similarly UK wikipedians are overrrepresented but their experiences add to the article. We need to build in more global experiences and that might take some time. The tag invites additional perspectives. In the mean time, it is important that the article comply with NPOV and WP:V by citing sources.--Arktos ^talk 08:29, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I understand that. However, the issue of the using the name "Near Easterners" has nothing to do with this article; we can discuss the title of Stereotypes of Near Easterners/Arabs there as there is already discussion of the title on its discussion page. As for this article, are you suggesting that you would prefer to create separate headings for "American POV" "UK POV" "Australian POV" etc? --Drenched 16:08, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

We can keep discussing the title and scope, but right now the article only covers those that could be called East Asians. violet/riga (t) 10:10, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

• Separate headings: No - I don't think separate headings are appropriate. It may be necessary to make clear where the perspective is coming from and it may be a perspective universally held or not. For example is the perspective held by Prince Charles common or confined to members of the British Royal family when visiting Australia? - would he have made the same error in the UK or the US or anywhere else? Do others make the same error? All we can probably put in the article is the reference to him making the error in Australia and the adverse reaction - it is up to the reader to deduce if it is a typical or an isolated stereotype. At least however it is referenced - it is probably not isolated and therefore represents the stereotype fairly.--Arktos ^talk 19:50, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

From my experience, somehow Indians (at least the ones I've met) don't associate themselves with the name "Asians" and Asian mean East/South East Asian. Does anyone else experience that or is it just me and just a local thing? --antilived^{T | C | G} 11:33, 17 January 2007 (UTC)

Popular Asian Women

How is this an asian stereotype? The section of the article about this supposed stereotype uses a trio of obscure cartoons as its examples. That's not a lot of examples, nor are these examples significant or influential. I've never heard of anyone attributing Asian females to "popular" in a stereotypical fashion. If anything, these cartoons were probably trying to be PC and go against stereotypes by having cool asians, since many asians in TV/movies are geeks. I think this section should be removed, since I don't believe such a stereotype actually exists. JimRaynor55 11:05, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree; I don't think the popular or the critical Asian woman are legitimately recognized stereotypes. And, they're both unreferenced. I'd support their removal as well. --Drenched 16:25, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Move to East Asian Stereotypes

This article was originally titled Asian stereotypes, but User:Violetriga changed it to East Asian on this edit. Violet Riga claims it only mentions East Asians. I also think the sterotypes are primarily East Asian, but most of the sources that are cited use "Asian" and do not distinguish between the different types. It is original research to say that when the source said "Asian" or "Asian American" that they only meant East Asians. In a related topic, if the source says names a stereotype of Japanese Americans, it is original research to say it applies to all East Asian Americans.--Dark Tichondrias 04:49, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This article is not about Asians. It is not original research to say East Asian. It is a simple fact that AmE has a different definition for "Asian" than other English dialects do, and this title is very confusing and plain wrong to those not using the US definition. violet/riga (t) 07:42, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

The title should be changed to "Asian American stereotypes".--Dark Tichondrias 23:48, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I disagree. While the article is currently mostly about such stereotypes they are across national and continental boundaries and I think it can be a useful article without the qualification. Stereotypes apply also in Australia and there is much in common with the US perspective. On the other hand, I assume that these are not stereoptypes promulgated within Asia - I am not sure where ythat thought takes us :-( --Arktos ^talk 00:13, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree that many similar stereotypes of Asians exist across national boundaries, which is why in drafting an intro to this article, I made the scope of the article generally "Western" rather than exclusively "American" despite its heavy American slant and the explicitly "American" angle of the parent article. Keeping the scope "Western" eliminates the problem of having different stereotypes in Asia by explicitly excluding them from the scope of this article (Although I suppose Australia isn't technically in the Western hemisphere). Of course, including all the different countries of the "West" could get quite messy. However, I think it should be fine and we can keep the sections as they are with little bits from each country in each section. The only exception is the "Historical origins" section; seeing as each Western country has a distinct history with Asians, I think it is necessary to have subsections for each country within this section. --Drenched 03:55, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

But the most important point is that this article does not look at "Asians"! It looks at "Orientals"! violet/riga (t) 09:02, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

From your perspective. We define those terms differently in our respective countries. "Orientals" where I come from is a politically incorrect term, and "Asians" refers to East Asians, South Asians, South East Asians, and basically everyone in the continent of Asia. I'm not opposed to renaming this article "Stereotypes of East Asians" as you did before, simply for the sake of clarity since "East Asians" (as far as I know) denotes the same group of people all over. However, doing this would explicitly eliminate South Asians from the scope of this article. --Drenched 22:53, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I know it is from my perspective, and that was the point I was trying to make. violet/riga (t) 23:01, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, one problem though; if we rename the article "Stereotypes of East Asians," that would also exclude South East Asians (i.e. Vietnam), which is pretty huge in this topic. Perhaps a better solution would be to keep the article name as it is and explicitly define "Asian" in the intro to avoid confusion. According to Wikipedia's definition of Asian, this article is indeed about Stereotypes of Asians. --Drenched 00:16, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry but I disagree with your interpretation of that article. "Stereotypes of South and East Asians" must be the way forward, else we'll have to go for something stupid like "Stereotypes of Asians using the American English usage of the word"! violet/riga (t) 07:48, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, but I disagree as well. The Wikipedia article about Asian (people) wikilinked in the intro of this article very clearly states, "The term Asian (also Asians, Asian race, Asian people) refers to people with ancestral origins in East Asia, Southeast Asia or South Asia." The article also explicitly lists which countries are included in these regions. Therefore, use of the term "Asian" in Stereotypes of Asians is accurate and consistent with Wikipedia's main article definition of "Asian." In my opinion, "Stereotypes of Asians" is our best (although not perfect) option for an article title because it is the broadest umbrella term giving us the greatest scope & flexibility, and it is concise. Even though "Asian" may be confusing to people using UK English, it is generally accurate for the majority of the Western world (not just Americans!) listed in Asian (people) using American, Australian, and Canadian English. I do understand your concern about varying international definitions of the word, so again, I think that explicit clarification of terminology in the article's introduction would solve the problem. Otherwise, we'd have to deal with a ridiculously cumbersome title like "Stereotypes of East Asians, Southeast Asians, and South Asians" which I'd really like the avoid. --Drenched 19:28, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

But this article is not about all of those groups of Asians, hence the problem with the title. violet/riga (t) 19:40, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

The article mentions South Asian Americans for the appearences they make on American TV. When Southeast Asian Americans have media portrayal, they will be in the article too. If British Asians have stereotypes in the UK, then you, Violet Riga, can add these stereotypes. --Dark Tichondrias 19:53, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

This article is about Asians in general, including all those groups. Although the article does use examples of East and Southeast Asians much more heavily, it does also mention South Asians too albeit briefly (e.g. "Hindoo invasion" under yellow peril, Indian taxi driver, Harold & Kumar). The model minority myth, perpetual foreigner stereotype, orientalism, and racial triangulation theory apply to all groups of Asians including South Asians. Adding more South Asian content would probably make the title more accurate from your perspective, which is great! If you have content to add, please do. I have some South Asian content (post 9/11 racial profiling etc.) but I'm a bit overwhelmed at the moment as I just researched and wrote 9 sections of this article from scratch with many more to go and classes are starting up again. --Drenched 20:13, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I just think that the stereotypes of "Asians" and "Orientals" is so vastly different that they couldn't possibly be covered by the same article. violet/riga (t) 20:46, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Oriental in UK is generally Asian elsewhere - Oriental is not a term we use in Australia for example. see Asian#Orientals_and_the_Orient I think we are arguing at cross purposes here and perhaps some clarification on the lead paragraph could be proposed.--Arktos ^talk 23:40, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Stereotyping is a messy topic; some stereotypes overlap across groups and some don't. Once we have enough content to viably split off South Asians into its own article, we can discuss that option (unless you want to stub it). However, at the moment, South Asian stereotypes doesn't have a home and doesn't exactly hurt article length or flow, so it might as well stay here for now. I'm going to fix the intro to clarify definition of "Asian" as per above. --Drenched 20:35, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Every Asian group has its specific stereotypes

I originally voted this article for AFD because I thought many of its stereotypes of particular Asian groups do not extend to other Asian groups and every source was pure opinion. East Asian stereotypes do not exist. In America, Chinese and Japanese are portrayed in movies as a separate culture with separate stereotypes. Everyone knows that Kung-fu, shaolin, China dolls, Chinese dragons, and yin-yangs come from China. Everyone knows, business men, samurai, ninja, and sumo come from Japan. Even Mongolians are not portrayed under an overarching "East Asian" set of stereotypes. Disney's Mulan and South Park's portrayal of the Mongols makes this clear. --Dark Tichondrias 05:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Stereotypes such as "martial artist", "not really Americans", and "speaks English poorly" get applied to people from more than one Asian country. Some stereotypes are country-specific, but others aren't. Ken Arromdee 20:30, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

It is true that ethnicity-specific stereotypes exist, but I disagree that overarching East Asian stereotypes are non-existant. The stereotypes that Ken Arromdee mentioned, Model Minority stereotypes, and perpetual foreigner stereotypes are all stereotypes that have affected all East Asian groups, not just one ethnicity in particular. For example, the perpetual foreigner stereotype has affected Japanese Americans through WWII internment, as well as Chinese Americans through immigration exclusion acts, etc. There have also been hate crimes against Asians in which an Asian of one ethnicity was killed because he was mistaken for another Asian ethnicity. In any case, it may be helpful to have a separate section to address ethnicity-specific stereotypes, but there most definitely are stereotypes of East Asians in general. --Drenched 04:04, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I do not think Southeast Asian stereotypes exist. The only Southeast Asian group portrayed are the Vietnamese in Vietnam War movies. Since they are not portrayed with character roles in these movies, no stereotypes exist for them.--Dark Tichondrias 05:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I do not think that South Asian steretypes exist. India is largely the only South Asian group ever portrayed on US TV. Most Americans do not care about the concept of South Asia. Like the purported "East Asian sterotype", any stereotype labeled South Asian is just an attempt to engender a sense of people-hood among South Asians. I doubt most Americans would apply Asian Indian stereotypes to Pakistanis or Bangladeshis, but certainly anybody who knows they are a different people would not.--Dark Tichondrias 05:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Stereotypes of Asian women

In Australia we have had a controversial deportation case of Vivian Solon. An Australian citizen she was deported to the Phillipines. Because she was Asian, it was assumed she was "Smuggled into Australia as a sex slave. Wants to return to the Philippines. Has been physically abused." DIMIA officials acted acted on unfounded assumptions about Solon (no evidence has been revealed that she was ever a sex slave - they just thought Phillipino -> sex slave). Before adding this "sex slave" stereotype, just wanted to check if any views about how to be added. Sexual slavery is obviously an awkward topic but I think not unique to Australia.--Arktos ^talk 00:28, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

It sounds like this information would belong under "Stereotypes of Asian women" under "Sexuality." However, do you feel that this topic and its related stereotype needs its own separate subheading, or should it go under the "China Doll" heading as a variation/extension/manifestation of the sexually submissive Asian woman? --Drenched 04:09, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Farfetched... and why is there no other stereotype article as thorough as this?

I find it amusing yet not so suprising that this article is so ridiculously long. I agree with much of these stereotypes, but many seem to be simply half-baked stereotypes made up by some angry asian man. For Godsake, every role in a movie or book portrayed by an asian is stated as a "common" asian stereotype. If an asian was portrayed as a baker in a movie, it would probably be put down on this page as the "Asian Baker Stereotype," or if an asian was portrayed as a normal guy walking down the street, it would be put down as "The Normal Guy Asian Stereotype." You have to admit, some of the stereotypes on this page are very farfetched. But that is beyond my point. My point is, whereas this page has dozens of stereotypes listed, whether they are farfetched or not, the African and Latino page have almost NO stereotypes listed. I don't find this that strange, as it probably represents the high percentage of Asians using the computer over other minorities (How's that for a stereotype?)—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 204.13.204.162 (talk • contribs) .

• I find your comments offensive - I am not Asian or of Asian descent. Australia has a long history of discimination agains Asians - see White Australia policy for example and most recently the Vivian Solon case. It seems our experience is mirrored in the US at least. The prejudices that are revealed by these government actions derive from stereotypes. I am sure there is room to correct the balance of articles on stereotypes related to other ethnicities - the answer is {{sofixit}}.

Your suggestion to delete this article based on Low on sources, heavy on original research. Beyond cleanup. is inappropriate. 38 footnotes is not exactly low on sources. If there is a specific assertion, or series of assertions, you find unsubstantiated, please highlight here on the talk page. Your rant about movies is insufficient for anybody to act on.--Golden Wattle ^talk 19:48, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Amen, Golden Wattle. This article is by no means a compilation of isolated random portrayals of Asians that we randomly put together, as you seem to suggest. This article is a well-referenced article about patterns of racial stereotyping in the media, history, legislature etc., and discusses published reputable works by many scholars and historians documenting and analyzing these patterns. If you took the time to actually take a look at the sources, you would see that the vast majority of this article has academically legitimate content and is not original research. --Drenched 04:12, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Porn Links

I am impressed that the noble wikipedians who researched this article even went to such dire lengths as including porn weblinks on the website. I don't think Porn links are relevant on any page except those that directly deal with the topic on hand. I think they are as unecessary as a ketchup company link would be on an article about Zanu-PF leaders. and even if it is relevant, the weblinks should be included on the article about Asian sexuality (if there is one), not on a page that doesn't directly concern them. Therefore, I deleted them. Stevo D 23:51, 22 September 2006 (UTC)

Stevo, Asian sexuality is directly tied in with Asian stereotypes. One of the core stereotypes of Asians is the supposed hypersexuality of Asian women and the supposed assexualness of Asian men. This is directly reflected in the popularity of Asian American porno actresses. Asian Americans make up only 3% of the US population, and Asian American women are by extension only 1.5% of the US population. Yet there are several high profile Asian female porn actresses. Asia Carrera and Tera Patrick are 2 of the main ones. Asian fetishism is a direct result of stereotypes of Asian sexuality and deserve to be addressed in this article.OneViewHere 00:31, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Okay, then if we are going to look at it that way, I guess Transexuals are victims too. according to wikipedias list of transexuals, there are QUITE ALOT of those in the porn industry (for example, Gia Darling, Allanah Starr), and I am pretty damn sure that they constitute less than 2% of the population. the point here is that, One: those links on that page were innapropriate, and belonged on the asian fetishism or asian porn page (if they have one) Two: Porn is just plain wierd. You can't say that porn is "Victimizing" Asians, because the porn industry victimizes anyone they can get thier hands on, and nothing with them is taboo. that's just the way it is. Therefore, to make assumptions of "stereotyping" is absurd, considering we are talking about the most absurd and nonchalant industry in the history of mankind. Stevo D

Stevo, American pornography in general is rife with racial stereotypes. Yes, pornography reflects the lowert common denominator, but it also is a reflection of social and racial stereotypes. So it is entirely appropriate and accurate to reference American pornography as a reflection of Asian stereotypes.OneViewHere 20:44, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Aaaaghh, Not Again!!!

Jesus pleasus, The people who write the articles on Asian Americans are at it again! I can't find enough things wrong with this article. Not only was it probably written by some person out to dispense racial justice in the form of the usual "Asian-Nothing-wrong-white-man-bad", But they go as far as to quote comedy movies, just to have something to bitch about! I mean, come on, quoting Rush Hour 2 (which plays off stereotypes of both characters and racism shoots back and forward between both Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker Ex. Jackie Chan to Chris Tucker: I will bitch slap you back to Africa, Blackanese, Etc.) and then calling the Australian policies "racist". I may agree with them, but that is an opinion, and is thus biased. I wish I could say that is it, but there is more, and ALOT more than that: claiming the Asian guy NEVER (notice that they are saying there are no exceptions by using the word never)gets the girl in ANY American movie (I coulda have sweared, that even though Jet Li didn't kiss Aaliyah in the film "Romeo Must Die" {he sited that would have been innapropriate because a family member just got killed} didn't he get her in the end? or what about Jackie Chan's uncle in "Rumble In The Bronx"? This article is unneutral as hell, and I think that it should be cleaned-up. It is in serious need, At least I think. Stevo D

LOL, so Jackie Chan's Uncle's Sister's brother got a girl in the movie. What a DEFINITIVE example of a stereotype-busting role. LOL. C'mon man. You know very well that the examples given in this article are not just about that one particular role but serve as examples of long-term existing stereotypes that have been fostered and perpetuated through dozens of roles and movies. Asian stereotypes didn't get created overnight. They have their roots in American colonialism and go back over 200 years. But according to YOU, Jackie Chan's Uncle got the girl in Rumble in the Bronx so everything is A-OK, right?

Psst, BTW, I think Lucy Liu's sister's mom's uncle's gardener dated a girl in "Kill Bill"!OneViewHere 00:26, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, I can answer this by saying that there just aren't that many movies with Asian actors in it because, while asians are rather visible, (like you said) they just aren't that much in the population but this will change as the community grows in numbers. example: A decade ago, there were very few entertainers of mexican origin in Hollywood, and that was because the community was still small. however, as the community grew, mexicans became more visible on TV and such (Daddy Yankee, Jessica Alba Danny Trejo etc). Asians are still a small, albeit growing, percentage, and things will change over time. Not every movie ends with a kiss or a makeout session, but even then, how many rambo movies ended in a kiss? (P.S.: It was Jackie Chan's UNCLE, not his uncle's sister's brother!) Stevo D

StevoD, your arguments don't hold water. The REASON for the stereotypes doesn't mean the stereotypes don't exist or that they aren't harmful. Nor is the Asian American population as a percentage of the US whole an EXCUSE for racist caricatures and stereotypes. Nobody here is interested in your JUSTIFICATIONS for why the stereotypes exist. That's not what this article is about. This article is about categorizing and detailing what the existing stereotypes ARE. If I wanted to hear your justifications, I'd create a Wikipedia article entitled "In Defense of Racism".

Look, I am not saying that stereotypes aren't hurtful, or that they don't offend. I am just saying that's human nature, and if we are going to create a page for asians, then we need one for every race. This page isn't even that good, for pointing out the stereotypes. If an asian guy walked into a coffee shop and asked for a mocha, this page would list him as "Mocha-ordering-Asian-guy", and would be hateful and offensive. And besides, not to discredit Asian's experiences in America, but Black-American people (to my knowledge) don't even have a page like this for them, and If anyone deserves, one, it's them.Stevo D 21:18, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Oh, and BTW, in regards to Rumble in the Bronx, turn on your sarcasm-detectors.OneViewHere 20:37, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

First of all, your criticism is welcome, but try to be please be polite, constructive, and objective about it. You appear to be making unfounded assumptions about the intention of this article and assume that it is an "Asian-Nothing-wrong-white-man-bad" article, but I strongly disagree. The title of this article is "Stereotypes of Asians," and I created it in order to compile and explore existing stereotypes of Asians as objectively as possible.

I see nothing wrong with quoting a comedy movie if it serves to illustrate an existing Asian stereotype; it's completely pertinent to the subject of this article. In fact, I took that Rush Hour quote in question directly from a published book that used that quote as an example of emasculation. If a scholar on the subject finds the quote acceptable to publish to illustrate emasculation, I think it's fine for Wikipedia too. Do we at any point in the article claim that Asians are saintly and don't stereotype other people? No. Do we ever claim that Asians are the only victims of racism and stereotyping? Of course not. It's irrelevant that there are a series of racist exchanges because the purpose of that quote is not to place blame on anyone or to evoke pity; it's purpose is to illustrate how Asians are emasculated in the media, and that quote serves its purpose. Also in that section, you criticize the use of the word "never." You have a valid point about using absolute words like that, so I removed the above instance of the word. This article does need cleanup, but unhelpful anger-inciting comments like "Aaaaghh, Not Again!!!" are really not appreciated and are counter-productive; instead, if you have suggestions, please contrubute in a civil constructive manner. --Drenched 03:52, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Steve D, the fact that stereotypes affect other races of people does not mean that this article should not exist. It means articles on those other races should also exist. And they do: Stereotypes of Arabs and Muslims, Stereotypes of Africans/Blacks, Stereotypes of American Indians, Stereotypes of Latinos, Stereotypes of Europeans/Whites. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 21:28, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

HongQiGong, thank you. You took the words right out of my mouth.OneViewHere 21:41, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree with the above. This article does need a clean-up, but it clearly serves a purpose. And for crying out loud, Wikipedia does represent "other" perspectives as well. To the list above, I would add the article on Dashan, which quite accurately reflects what some "Caucasians" feel about this ubiquitous figure. If someone wants to we can even write an article about "Caucasian stereotypes in Asian movies" or whatever.--Niohe 01:44, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

That's It...

"Asians should stop whining as in Asian made films, there is not one movie where they used a white guy either."

I can't take it anymore. This article has gotten worse since I have suggested it's cleanup. I think we need to scrap this article and start from scratch. with sentences like these, who needs a bad article! This Article is becoming a racist hate page for both Asian and White propaganda against each other. I can't take it anymore. If no one does anything about it, I will tirelessly work to fix this whole damn article by myself. Stevo D 23:02, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

Stevo, you are out of line. This article very accurately describes racial stereotypes of Asians as perpetrated by western media. Every Asian American alive has experience with these steretypes. Your only argument seems to be that you don't think these stereotypes are valid and that the article is somehow an attack on white people. If you try to rewrite this article, I will be right there to revert it back. Rewrites should be a result of group consensus.OneViewHere 00:16, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Okay, then, OneViewHere, you suggested that we keep the quote: "Asians should stop whining as in Asian made films, there is not one movie where they used a white guy either." on the page? have it at thee, then. I don't think it is very accurate, neither do I think it makes sense, nor do I think that it is very nice, but what the hell, you are so smart, It doesn't matter what is right or wrong, as long as OneViewHere gets what he wants, right? Listen, if you want to spread "AZN pryde" and "Asian Victimism", go spread it somewhere else. If you want to spread "White Pride" or "White Victimism" (Like that sentence above suggests), make a Myspace page or something. BUT NOT HERE! I am not saying you are like that, but that rule should and does apply to everyone. And in regards to your "group consensus" idea, it doesn't matter if we all agree on it or not, but rather if it is correct or not, and if it has NEUTRAL CREDIBLE SOURCES, for as Jimbo Wales once said: "WIKIPEDIA IS NOT A DEMOCRACY!" That point can't be stressed enough. Stevo D 05:56, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

If there are *grammatical* problems that can be easily corrected, then by all means do so. But that's not what you're complaining about. You're using the grammatical errors to attack the very premise of this article. And I find it ridiculous that an article that is about Asian Stereotypes is seen by you as an "AZN Pryde" article. You have absolutely no basis for that claim. Articulating western stereotypes of Asian Americans has nothing to do with promoting racial pride, -nor is it "bashing whites". Stop bringing your own baggage into this article.OneViewHere 20:33, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

If you notice, I said "White Pride" too. Stevo D 21:18, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. No offense, but it's no wonder that the article has gotten worse since your suggestions because you presented your points in an extremely rude way that has only fueled hateful flaming on both sides. This article does not need to be scrapped. It contains a very substantial quantity of well-referenced scholarly information. It does have content that I personally think needs a lot of work or removal, but such changes should be discussed here and fixed, and the whole article should not be indiscriminately deleted. If you'd like to contribute to the article, please let's discuss changes and issues here as Wikipedia is a group effort, and you are not the definitive authority on this topic. Thanks. --Drenched 04:10, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Quote farm template

I'm not sure exactly how many quotes an article this size must contain for someone to want to put the template:quotefarm up at the top, but regardless, I've removed most of the quotes, and so I've have removed the quotefarm template. All the quotes were referenced, so all I did was shortened and paraphrase the quotes. Interested readers can click on the reference links to read the sources. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 19:36, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Revisiting idea of moving the article

I'd like to revisit the idea of moving the article. Not because this article does not include South Asians or that the word "Asian" is ambiguous. It's true that we can add more about stereotypes of South Asians, but this article is currently 46 KBs big at the time of this comment I'm posting. The recommended article size is 32 KBs. I propose we move it to "Stereotypes of East Asians", and split the existing content on South Asians to another article. There was a concern that "East Asian" would then exclude the Vietnamese. Actually that is not necessarily so, as the East Asia article explains, Vietnam can be considered culturally East Asian. And we can also explicitly state that the Vietnamese are included in "Stereotypes of East Asians".

There are obvious distinct stereotypes of South Asians that are not shared by East Asians. The cab driver stereotype, for example, or the convience store owner. Trying to squeeze in both East Asian and South Asian stereotypes would make the article too big. It's also true that these two demographics do share some of the same stereotypes, like the model minority myth. However, I see no reason why that should stop us from splitting the article though. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 19:59, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree that the inclusion of South Asians in this article is kind of messy since some parts apply to them and some don't. I wouldn't mind creating a separate article for South Asians that's just a stub for now & relocating the content.

My main concern is that other countries that we are discussing aren't included under the name "East Asian." Even if we sort of stretch the definition to include Vietnamese who are listed as being culturally East Asian, that still excludes the Philippines, Thailand and other Southeast Asian countries. So as I see it, our options are: a) keep the title as it is & just move the South Asian content & redefine "Asian" in the intro to exclude South Asians (although this will confuse the Brits and isn't so accurate) b) move the article to "Stereotypes of East Asians" and just explicitly list all the East and South East Asian countries even though most of the South East Asian countries aren't included in the definition of "East Asian," or c) rename the article to "Stereotypes of East Asians and South East Asians" which would be more accurate but more cumbersome as well. What do you think would be the best course of action? --Drenched 01:52, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I definitely see the dilemma, and I'm not sure there's a solution that'll satisfy everybody. And I think there's an ambiguity as to whether or not some of the stereotypes mentioned - like Fu Manchu and Charlie Chan, really apply to groups like Filipinos or Thais, for example (maybe they do, maybe they don't). But that's actually precisely an argument to keep it at "Stereotypes of Asians" instead of moving the article to "East Asians". Maybe we need to add something to explain that some of these stereotypes may be more applicable to some ethnic groups than they are to others. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 19:02, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Well...how about if we go with option a) for now? Regardless of what we end up naming this article, it still remains that South Asian content needs to be split off, and some sort of clarifying statement about the scope of this article needs to be written in the intro right? So maybe we can do that first and come to a consensus about the article title later. --Drenched 00:17, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Sure, that's fine. Any input from other editors on this? Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 01:44, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

The Template:Content tag.

The Template:Content tag says that:

"This tag should be used when it is believed that particular information being deleted from an article is notable and relevant and therefore should be allowed in the article. Importantly, the tag lets the reader know he may not be getting the full story due to the exclusion of that piece of information. On the article's Discussion page, note the information you believe should cease being excluded before placing the tag."

Exactly what piece of relevant information is missing that should be inserted? If nothing specific can be cited here, I'll be removing that tag. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 20:46, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Removed 3 smaller sections

I've removed three sections - "Oppressors of Asian women", "Asian male warrior", and "Asian sorcerors". They were kind of short and unsourced. Most or all of the other sections are very well sourced. And to be honest, I've personally never heard of the latter two of the three as stereotypes. The "Asian sorcerors" section more or less describe the stereotype that Asian people are mystical, which is already covered earlier. And really, that stereotype is not reserved for Asian men alone.

At any rate, there are definitely more stereotypical portrayals than are listed here on this article. But I'm not sure we need to have whole sections devoted to each and every one of them. Wouldn't it be better to have this article concentrate on the nature and consequences of stereotyping Asian people, instead of an explanation of every possible stereotype? Of course, certain prominent stereotypes do need to be mentioned, and I like the ones that the article does mention already.

For anybody who is interested in the subject of the stereotyping of minorities and the dichotomy between the "good" stereotype and the "bad" stereotype, I can't stress enough what a great paper Frank Chin's "Racist Love" is. You can read it here[1]. (Note - modelminority.com is a site I don't personally like that much, but they host the article and is the first to show up on a Google search.)

Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 15:51, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Hong, I agree with most you said, but I do think that the stereotype of the "oppressive Asian man / opressors of Asian women" is deserving of it's own category. Asian men in general are often portrayed as abusive towards Asian women. A clear example of this would be Russell Wong's character in Joy Luck Club. The other ones, (asian male warrior and asian sorcerer) are indeeded a little bit silly and overdone. In general, those 2 stereotypes fall into the broader category of Asian culture being portrayed as mystical and magical.(think Big Trouble in Little China) The archtype of the abusive Asian man falls into the broader stereotype of the "white knight" who comes to the Asian woman's rescue to "save" her from abusive Asian men. OneViewHere 20:07, 27 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for removing those sections; I've been wanting to for a while but am always very very hesitant to bulk delete. I've never heard of the latter 2 stereotypes either. Maybe when we actually have legitimate sourced content we can re-create the "oppressive Asian man" section; the current version wasn't very well-written so perhaps its temporary omission is for the better until someone really sits down and writes a good version. However, with the removal of those sections, there are no gender-specific stereotypes that don't fall under the heading of "Sexuality," so I might just remove that subheading for now.

Sure, I think a section about repercussions and the significance of stereotypes, or some sort of synthesis would be good in this article...maybe in the intro or as a concluding segment? However, I feel like you'd have to be very very careful and source every letter of a section like that because it'd be much easier to accuse for being soapboxy or NPOV than a simple listing/explaining of existing stereotypes (which has already come under attack as it is). So while I definitely think a section like that is very relevant and would be beneficial, I'd be very conservative/cautious in proceeding so that it doesn't jeopardize the article in general. --Drenched 00:11, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I just think it would be unrealistic to have a section for every possible stereotype there is. The article is already too big as it is. But if we can split more content off to other articles, it may be do-able to have all these sections. For example, maybe we need to move more content off into the Fu Manchu and Charlie Chan articles. Maybe it's time to create articles for, for example Perpetual Foreigner (something that affects Latinos as well), China Doll, Dragon Lady (these two are redirects right now), etc. Much like Magic Negro and Hillbilly. And there's already a category called Category:Stereotypes for articles on specific stereotypes. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 01:42, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I personally think that "Asian Warrior" stereotype, while not a negative one, is none the less a stereotype, and thus should be kept. I can't think of a movie taking place in asia where there isn't a mystical asian warrior, to be honest in fact, just the other day, I saw the movie The Protector, produced and made by Thais, and it shows that even The Thais utilise the Martial artist/honorable/mystical warrior stereotype!Stevo D 00:54, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Stevo, you are now contradicting yourself. Earlier you criticized the article for having too many categories. To quote you: "If an asian guy walked into a coffee shop and asked for a mocha, this page would list him as "Mocha-ordering-Asian-guy". A reasonable person would accept that stereotypes of Asians as "mystical warriors" can easily be folded into the stereotype of the Asian martial artist as a category.OneViewHere 01:28, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't mind that section being re-inserted if it is well-sourced like all the other sections. My concerns are 1)this article is a little bigger than the recommended 32 KBs, 2)the "Asian Warrior" section was shorter than the rest and not well sourced like all the other sections, and 3)this particular stereotype doesn't seem to be one of the more prevalent ones (at least in my opinion). Actually I think more accurately stated, Asian people (men and women both, really) are stereotyped as martial artists. If we are to re-insert the section, I would like it to be the "Martial Artist" stereotype instead. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 01:30, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I think "Asian Martial Artist" would be a more accurate title rather than "warrior." I agree that the martial artist stereotype does exist, but the previous "warrior" version included random stuff like Asian cops (etc.) which I don't think is part of the stereotype and really didn't describe the stereotype accurately at all. It was also very lacking in sources. Also, that section was located under Asian male stereotypes. In my opinion the Asian martial artist stereotype applies to both men and women and should not be under the male heading. --Drenched 20:12, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Divide Article, or make more inclusive?

Maybe this was already brought up, but I propose that we split this article into two catagories, or change the content to reflect asia as a whole: East Asian Stereotypes and South Asian Stereotypes, because, as a whole, this article only reflects the stereotypes of East Asians (Japanese, Chinese, Korean, etc.) and not alot of the rest of Asia(Asia is HUGE, and that includes Siberians, Mongolians, Afghanis, etc.). For Example, Kazakhstan (Borat, anyone?) is a huge chunk of asia, yet doesn't even get recognition on this page, and Iran and Turkey, while politically apart of the Middle East, are Asian States. Thus, if someone was to put either one of these peoples into the catagory of Arab Stereotypes, that would be a stereotype unto itself. That was the original reason why I wanted to scrap this article: It is very biased and opinionated, and until it is made to represent the broader spectrum of asian people, will continue to be. Stevo D 01:07, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Stevo, I have never heard of Turkey or Iran being referred to as Asian countries. You have to use a bit of common sense here. When people refer to "Asia" or "Asians" most commonly they are referring to east Asian countries and peoples. Also, I have to question your motives here, because you have been constantly challenging the very premise of this article from the start. You tried to have the article deleted on the grounds that "there are no articles for black stereotypes or Latino stereotypes". When Hong proved you wrong by providing links to the Wikipedia articles that dealt with Black and Latino stereotypes, you did not provide a response.

If you feel that the term "Asian Stereotypes" is confusing or non-inclusive, then a simple sentence at the beginning of the article would suffice to clarify things. ie "this article refers specifically to East Asian stereotypes. For stereotypes of South Asians, please refer to article XXXXX". OneViewHere 01:22, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I actually started a new discussion about this above - Talk:Stereotypes_of_Asians#Revisiting_idea_of_moving_the_article. The problem is that some of the stereotypes may or may not apply to Southeast Asians as well. There's not exactly a definitive outline of what each and every Asian ethnic groups these stereotypes may apply to. That's why it may be wise to just leave it at "Asian" for now instead of moving to "East Asian". Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 01:55, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

In response to OneViewHere's remark, Turkey and Iran have both been historically and geographically Asian countries. Infact, one of the key reasons why many think that Turkey doesn't belong in the EU is the fact that 95% is in Asia. and Iran has always been considered Asian as well, both culturally and geographically (This is where many make a mistake: Iran's Islamic culture often gets interchanged with it's historic culture). Too this day, many Nations consider Iran a predominately asian nation, and not Arab, as the STEREOTYPE suggests. Iran was also the center of civilization in the Fertile Crescent. Thus, I justify why Iran and Turkey should be included. Stevo D 04:48, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

The issue is not so much whether or not those countries are in Asia. The issue is whether or not Middle Easterners are referred to as "Asian". Having said that, I think we're going along with the definition in the Asian article. I think it may be better if you were to change the definition outlined in that article first, before we include Middle Easterners here. Otherwise there would be a discrepancy. The fact of the matter is that almost no country refer to Middle Easterners as "Asian". Not even the BBC would do this. See this map[2]. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 05:24, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

But according Too this map, India isn't listed as Asia either! Stevo D

Exactly. People from the Middle East /Arabs are not commonly referred to as "Asian". As such, I recommend that we add a statement at the beginning of the article that says something along the lines of "This article refers primarily to stereotypes of East Asians. For racial stereotypes of SouthEast Asians and people from the middle east, please refer to article XXXX". I also recommend removing the section on Kazakhstan (Borat???) that Stevo recently added.OneViewHere 19:20, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. Everyone may interpret the definition of "Asian" differently, but ultimately for the purposes of Wikipedia, we need to be consistent with Wikipedia's definition of Asian in this article. --Drenched 20:16, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

It seems unreasonable to use MIHO from Sin City as an example of a dragon lady, as at no point in the story does she come off as sinister or traitourous, nor does she use her sexuality to advance her goals. Furthermore characters such as GoGo Yubari and O-ren Ishii don't seem to belong either within the larger cotnext of the film, as they were characters that were borrowed from native japanese films such as Battle Royale and Lady Snowblood. --ninjawookie 12:06, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Stereotypes of South Asians

I created the suggested split page Stereotypes of South Asians and moved over content from this page (overlapping stereotypes: model minority, exclusion/Hindoo invasion. Independent stereotypes: savagery, confusion with Arabs). It's really just a precursory stub for now and needs more explanation, but it's created. With the creation of this page, I removed the South Asian content from Stereotypes of Asians. Perhaps a redirect/disambig line needs to go at the top of this page to direct to Stereotypes of South Asians to avoid confusion. The intro also needs an explanation clarifying the scope of this article. Also, in the sections of overlapping stereotypes, even though the South Asian content is removed, perhaps there should still be a mention that those stereotypes also apply to South Asians.

Personally, I don't know what to do with the Central Asian section and don't really think it belongs in this article because the countries discussed in that section aren't listed in the categories in the Asian page, and Central tends to be grouped with Southern Asia more than East/Southeast Asia, but I guess that's a whole different issue. --Drenched 20:46, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Honestly, in light of the fact that more editors will probably come in now and then to find problem with the title, with whether or not the content is only applicable to East Asians, and trying to insert content such as stereotypes of Middle Easterners, I think we may consider moving this article to "Stereotypes of East Asians". Then maybe at the top, include a disclaimer saying something like:

This article is about stereotypes of East Asians. For the purpose of this article, East Asians refer to people whose ancestry is from, but not necessarily limitted to, countries and regions that may be considered culturally East Asian. Some of the stereotypes mentioned in this article may also be applicable to ethnic groups outside of this East Asian categorisation, such as Filipinos, Thais, etc.

And then we can make "Stereotypes of Asians" a disambiguous page. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 23:38, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree that other editors will probably come & take issue with the title later on...it's going to be messy & imperfect no matter what we do. I'm not opposed to moving to Stereotypes of East Asians and saying they're stereotypes primarily of East Asians but also often apply to South East Asians as well. Although I'd more readily say that the blurriness and overlap of stereotyping is more caused by the West's visual or ideological perceptions of the various groups of Asians rather than the actual cultural similarities/differences of these groups of Asians.

The disambig page sounds like a good idea. Are the only links going to be for Stereotypes of East Asians and Stereotypes of South Asians though? Is Central Asia going to go with South Asia then, or get its own page? (Honestly, who is going to type "Central Asian stereotypes" into a search engine?) --Drenched 00:42, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

That's a good point. Nobody's really going to type "Central Asian stereotypes" into a search engine. Another idea is, instead of making it a disambiguous page, we can divide this article into sections for East Asians, South Asians, Central Asians, etc, and link to main articles for each group, if the main articles exist. Right now, we have enough material for an article just devoted to "Stereotypes of East Asians", so we'll do a main article link in the section for East Asians. We can do the same for South Asians, too, although there's not much content in that article right now. What I'm suggesting is something like this[3]. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 06:10, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, that definitely looks like it could work. Sort of like what we did for Ethnic stereotypes in American media except hopefully not as messy? But I think the Stereotypes of East Asians section on the Stereotypes of Asians split page should make mention to include Southeast Asians too (even if we don't want to rename the title of the article itself). --Drenched 21:20, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, we can definitely make mention of Southeast Asians in the East Asian section. And I think an East Asian stereotype article itself should mention that some of the stereotypes may be applicable to Southeast Asians. If we don't have any objections, I'll start working on revamping the article this way in my scratchpad. Of course, all interested editors are welcome to contribute. When that's done, most of the content of this article will be moved to Stereotypes of East Asians. Hong Qi Gong (Talk - Contribs) 01:43, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good! --Drenched 02:50, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

The South Asian section should not have been made into a separate article because their stereotypes overlap with East and Southeast Asians. The Turban Tide and Yellow Peril are the same kind of xenophobic response to foreigners. The savage stereotype was applied to Japanese during WWII. The model minority stereotype is the same for Chinese Americans. The confusion with another group of people based on physical features applies to East and Southeast Asians. Southeast Asians might be confused with Pacific Islanders. East Asians might be confused with American Indians, especially Eskimos.--Dark Tichondrias 07:53, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Problems with keeping the article together were detailed in the discussion Talk:Stereotypes_of_Asians#Revisiting_idea_of_moving_the_article. There is overlap in some stereotypes like the ones you've mentioned, but many other stereotypes discussed in these articles really apply only to East Asians or East Asians & Southeast Asians...it's pretty blurry. As I see it, it's easier & more accurate to just split the articles and be a tad redundant in mentioning the relevant stereotypes (i.e. model minority etc.) in both articles, than to keep all the stereotypes in one article and have people be confused and assume that certain stereotypes apply to South Asians when in fact many do not. There are also stereotypes that apply to South Asians that do not apply to East/Southeast Asians, and as was mentioned above, article length is a concern as we are already over the limit, which is another reason why we split the article. --Drenched 00:47, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

Changing Emasculation Section

There is no reference proving that Chinese men in the 1800's averaged 4'10". That is a ridiculously short height. Even with malnutrition and poorer health care, a height of 4'10" would practically mean they were midgets. I am removing that statement and adding some information on why Asian men did "women's work" during those times. It's not really because of the lack of women in their communities, but because Chinese men of the time were not allowed to work in certain professions. Whites would go out and lynch Chinese men they saw as an economic threat to their livelihoods, therefore the only work available to Chinese men at that time was work that white men deemed beneath them. ie, "women's work" such as Laundry, childcare, and cooking.OneViewHere 17:59, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, I did get that specific height statistic from the source that I cited in the inline reference. Directly from the book (Prasso, 115): "The perceptions of femininity were not aided by the men's height - averaging 4'10" - and slight builds, and the fact that they took up "women's work" on the frontier." The source that she cited that paragraph with was: Stephen E. Ambrose, Nothing Like It in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad, 1863-1869 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2001), 150-152. Its inclusion isn't a big deal either way, but I'm just saying that I didn't make it up out of nowhere & by my standards it's a valid statistic to use. --Drenched 00:32, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Ok, I'll accept that you got it from that source. I just still find it hard to believe. Just think for a moment how tall 4'10" is. That's about the height of one of my golf clubs. I know that people in general hundreds of years ago regardless of race were shorter due to poorer nutrition. For example, if you go to the museums and look at the armor that the medivel knights wore in England, the armor is very short. But I'm wondering where Stephen Ambrose got that statistic from. Did the railroad bosses make a habit of measuring the height of their workers? If the avg. Chinese man back then was 4'10", that means the women must have been even shorter. So were Chinese women 4'5" back then? Do you realize just how short that is? I've seen pictures of the Chinese in America back in the 1800's and they do not appear *that* short.OneViewHere 07:30, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Is emasculine a word? I'm aware that some people use it (in the sense of emasculate(adj.), not masculine, effeminate) but I've never seen it in a dictionary and it seems strange from a linguistic point of view.--87.162.26.224 05:06, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Poor driving skills

It is amazing how this "stereotype" was just briefly mentioned in the beginning of the article without any details as to whether or not this may actually be true. This is such a widespread belief that it certainly requires a separate section in the article. Politically correct BS aside, we all know that many Chinese, especially women, are horrible drivers. There should be enough stats out there to prove that fact. But those stats may not be easily available as I suppose insurance companies would never admit for obvious reasons that they do any kind of racial profiling... I personally had two accidents in six years. In both cases it was the other driver's fault. In both cases it was a stupid chinese woman. The only difference was the first one ran a red light and nearly killed me, while the other one just hit me from behind. I see tons of those idiots driving slowly in the left lane, changing lanes unexpectedly, or otherwise acting incoherently. How is that a "stereotype?" Unlike small penises and all that crap, it is a fact of life. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.29.78.106 (talk • contribs) 2006-09-30 21:42:20

I'm sorry you've had such bad driving experiences, but your comments are blatantly racist, as is clear from your last sentence. Shall we put a section on the violence of blacks violence, in a section on african americans, because I have experienced aggressive physical behavior from them? A few other points: driving is a skill...how is this racially determined. Also, I find it amusing that this stereotype directly contradicts other stereotypes of asians as robots who can do repetitive tasks very well but lack creativity.

Well gee, I'm so glad your personal experiences are so definitive. I've had 2 white people who have worked for my company in the past, and both of them were lazy as hell. Therefore I should be able to extrapolate from that experience that all white people are lazy. After all, my experience is definitive, right?

It's kinda ironic, but your mentality in a way demonstrates exactly why racial stereotypes are so damaging....OneViewHere 07:33, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

Hmm this article needs some fact checking...Tom Cruise was listed as being the last samuri, in the movie the Daimyo looked to have been the last samuri as japan was industrializing...oh well just a matter of opinion. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.2.4.199 (talk • contribs) 2006-10-03

I don't know if Asians cause more accidents than the average, but here's a statistic regarding motor vehicle crash death rates among Asians and other groups: [4] (pg 6 of 16) Shawnc 14:17, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

Sideways Vagina

What about that sideways vagina thing? I seriously doubt anyone believes it anymore, but it still deserves mention as an historical stereotype/myth. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.122.208.51 (talk • contribs) 2006-10-04

I doubt anybody actually ever really believed that Asian women had "sideways vaginas", as it's a physical impossibility. It was more of a joke/put-down. The joke arose from the idea that Asians have "slanted" eyes.OneViewHere 23:16, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

A Couple of Edits

I reverted a couple of edits some people have made recently that just didn't make any sense. One person replaced the word "Backwards" with "Dark Ages" in the Central Asians section. ie "Central Asia especially the Former Soviet-bloc, is often seen as a Dark Ages region". That sentence doesn't even sound grammatically correct. Another person added this sentence: " Many movies however portray Asian men as successful people like having a college degree, and having a high I.Q., but yet mysteriously lives in extreme poverty." Umm....huh??? Not only is the sentence written poorly but I can't think of any movie that has this kind of portrayal. I'm sure there may be an example of that somewhere, but in order for something to be a stereotype it has to be a pervasive portrayal that has sunken into the collective conciousness, thus becoming a stereotype. I doubt you'd find many Caucasians who think of Asians as being college-educated but poor.....OneViewHere 23:26, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

I support your edits. That didn't make much sense to me either.--Drenched 03:19, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

Stereotype of mainlander Chinese

I have been looking around other related sites including this one and I cannot find a single thing about sterotypes of Mainland Chinese people or commonly people from rural areas by Hong Kongers as it is very common in Hong Kong and in HK medias, would this warrant a mention anywhere?

What stereotypes of "mainlander Chinese" are you referring to? My initial feeling is that this article is primarily geared towards non-Asian people's stereotypes of Asian people. If we are going to get into Asian people's stereotypes of each other, then that's a whole other article. You'd have Chinese stereotypes of Japanese people, Japanese stereotypes of Chinese people, Chinese stereotypes of Taiwanese, etc. etc. etc. I don't think the scope of this article covers that.OneViewHere 18:39, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

First line of this article: "Stereotypes of Asians are oversimplified ethnic stereotypes of Asian people (including East Asians and Southeast Asians) and are found in many Western societies." Perhaps you cna create a new article to contain content you are discussing if there are no existing articles yet. --Drenched 03:18, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

There is some but might not be relevant to current. It might be better to define what kind of "Mainland Chinese" we are talking about (is that Person visitors? Immigrant or bussiness traveler? What background might he have?)Plus if you do streotypes of Asian that is precivied by anothes group's of Asian, the article will need more strucuture. --MeowKun | Meowi Talk 05:05, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

That person on top is probably referring to people who live in rural parts of China, in Hong Kong films, they, otherwise commonly known as Villagers are commonly portrayed as money grabbing, greedy and from a poor family. On the positive side, they are portrayed as communial, when they are from the same village.

SE Asians

I think that Southeast Asians have their own stereotype. This is in part because of the climate and resources and government. Plus SE Asians look very distinct from E Asians, and have a different related language.

I think you're getting a bit too granular. Do you think people who believe in Asian stereotypes make that kind of distinction between "East Asians" and "SouthEast Asians"? To those types of people, Asians are all the same without respect to geography, culture, or ethnicity.OneViewHere 20:58, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree that Southeast Asians are TOTALLY different from East Asians. East Asians are Mongoloid and Southeast Asian are not. Eventhough there are currently a great number of East Asian residing in Southeast Asia, that doesn't mean that we can assume that both are the same. I am a Southeast Asian, and East Asian are more intelligent than us, their skin is fair and ours is brown/dark brown. Usually they have straight hair and slant eyes whereas we have wavy/straight hair and normal round eyes. People may get confused because it is normal to find a person who is a mix between SOutheast Asian and East Asian. Yes, I agree that "To those types of people, Asians are all the same without respect to geography, culture, or ethnicity" but this is an encyclopedia - why must we make an article that;s supposed to follow only one group's opinion or norm? The fact is that East Asian and South East Asian are different, and has different stereotypes. To us Asian, all white men are the same. Hence, should be merge American article with European? Nick 10:46, 11 June 2007

The Last Samurai

I feel that it's kind of excessive to have 3 explanatory notes about one movie given as one example of one stereotype. The article is about stereotypes of Asians, not the various interpretations of The Last Samurai's title and Japanese grammar. If no one raises objections I'm going to remove the notes and/or mention of The Last Samurai from the article if bias is an issue. --Drenched 03:16, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Asian IQ

The wording of this section is kind of NPOV. Also, it states that the high-Asian-IQ stereotype has been promoted by White supremacists, and I feel that that assertion needs some explanation because it sounds counterintuitive.

This section contains the sentence: "In a study involving individuals in the United States that scored over 180 on an IQ test, 20% of these were Asians, which conflicts with this stereotype."

That doesn't make any sense to me. If the stereotype is that Asians have higherIQs than the average American, the 20% statistic supports rather than refutes the stereotype. If this statistic is accurate, Asians would be overrepresented in the >180 IQ population, since they make up less than 20% of the general American population. --Drenched 05:12, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

I still have issues with this section:

• "White supremacist groups do that to falsely advertise that there are more White "geniuses" than Asian "geniuses".

This sentence doesn't make much sense. How does promoting the stereotype of high Asian IQ advertise the idea of more White geniuses than Asian geniuses? Totally counter-intuitive, so if it is true, it needs a clearer explanation.

• "However this conflicts with the stereotype that Asians have an IQ of low standard deviation, since there are so many Asians scoring high."

Again, the 20% statistic given still says nothing about the standard deviation of IQ in the general Asian population! To prove that there is a high level of deviation in the intelligence of the general Asian population, you need to demonstrate a wide bell curve in that population. Assuming that the statistic that 20% of Americans of all races scoring >180 are Asians is true, it is ALSO concurrently possible for 100% of the general Asian population to have IQs >180, or 1% or 50% or whatever % of the general Asian population...you can't tell from that statistic!

I'm going to remove those statements unless a logical argument or explanation is made otherwise. --Drenched 06:10, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

"White supremacist groups do that to falsely advertise that there are more White "geniuses" than Asian "geniuses".

This sentence doesn't make much sense. How does promoting the stereotype of high Asian IQ advertise the idea of more White geniuses than Asian geniuses? Totally counter-intuitive, so if it is true, it needs a clearer explanation.

You seem you do not understand what standard deviation is. Because there is a stereotype that Asians have a low standard deviation, there are few Asian geniuses and few Asians that are mentally retarded.

White supremacist groups falsely advertise that there are more White "geniuses" by saying that there are more White "geniuses" and more mentally retarded Whites. Because the gap between the geniuses and the mentally retarded is big, the standard deviation is big. The IQs of the "geniuses" and the "mentally retarded" average out in a IQ score lower than Asians.

71.175.41.54 02:46, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

Your explanation of the White Supremacist logic is much clearer here than it was in the article, and I think adding it would be beneficial in clarifying your statement in the article.

I actually have a very clear understanding of what standard deviation is. I do understand the general point you are trying to make, but again, saying that 20% of the people scoring >180 in the study were Asians or that Asians are overrepresented says nothing about the distribution of IQ scores in the general Asian population. Why? Because 1) the mean IQ score in the general Asian population is never given. You seem to be assuming that the mean IQ score is much much lower than 180 (which may very well be the case). However, if a mean is not assumed (which it can't be, since none is given), the mean could possibly be around 180 in which case there would be very little standard deviation in the Asian population given this statistic. Also, 2) it is possible for Asians to be overrepresented in the >180 population in this study AND for that "genius" population of Asians to be statistically insignificant in comparison to the general Asian population. It is possible to have a very narrow bell curve with a very low level of standard deviation AND have outliers very far from the mean.

I hope I have made clear why I took up issue with your reasoning, although at this point I feel that we're just splitting hairs with regards to statistics. I feel that the general gist about the stereotype of little variation in Asian IQ is made quite clear in the article and it isn't necessary to go into more detail at this point.--Drenched 06:55, 1 February 2007 (UTC)